The present invention relates generally to implantable medical devices. More particularly, it pertains to displaying arrhythmia episodes based on data taken from implantable medical devices.
A normal human heart beats between 60 to 100 times per minute. However, when a person gets excited or frightened or has an illness such as congenital heart disease, the heart may beat faster than 100 times per minute. A disruption in the normal heart rate or rhythm is known as arrhythmia.
Arrhythmias are caused by abnormal functioning of the electrical conduction of the heart. Normally, the chambers of the heart (atria and ventricles) work in a coordinated manner. The electrical conduction begins with an electrical impulse originating in the sinoatrial node. This impulse is then moved through the atria, stimulates them to contract, and then is moved to its final destination at the ventricles, where it stimulates them to contract also. Any problems along this conduction path may cause arrhythmias.
Certain types of arrhythmia are lethal and may cause severe damage to various organs in the body by initially decreasing the pumping of the heart. When the pumping of the heart is decreased by more than a few seconds, blood circulation is essentially stopped, and organ damage (such as brain damage) may occur within a few minutes.
Arrhythmias have been treated by the use of a pacemaker that applies shock therapy. A pacemaker is a medical device that delivers controlled electrical pulses to an electrode that is implanted adjacent to or in the heart. These controlled electrical pulses stimulate the heart so that it will contract and beat at a desired rate. The delivery of these controlled electrical pulses is often tailored to the individual patient.
A physician at times needs to reassess the therapy applied by the pacemaker. One technique is for the physician to obtain a printed listing of the therapy data from the pacemaker and reformulate the therapy. However, what has been frustrating for the physician is that the use of the listing of data to reformulate the therapy has been laborious, time-intensive, and error-prone.
Thus, what is needed are systems, devices, structures, and methods to ease the use of the therapy data by a physician.
The above-mentioned problems with the use of data from an implantable medical device as well as other problems are addressed by the present invention and will be understood by reading and studying the following specification. Systems, devices, structures, and methods are described which ease the use of therapy data by a physician.
In particular, an illustrative embodiment includes an exemplary display. This display comprises a first graph to show a frequency of at least one type of ventricular arrhythmia over a predetermined amount of time. The display also comprises a second graph to show a frequency of at least one type of atrial arrhythmia over the predetermined amount of time.
Another illustrative embodiment includes an exemplary method of performing a medical diagnostic. The method comprises receiving data stored in an implantable medical device, viewing a display that includes at least one graph showing the frequency of at least one type of arrhythmia over a predetermined period of time. The graph is formed from the data received from the implantable medical device. The method further comprises deriving a diagnostic based at least on the graph.
A further illustrative embodiment includes an exemplary method of therapy. The method comprises viewing a display that includes at least one graph showing the frequency of at least one type of arrhythmia over a predetermined period of time. The method further comprises deriving a set of programming variable values based at least on the graph to program an implantable medical device. The method further comprises transmitting the set of programming variable values to the implantable medical device so as to apply a therapy when a patient experiences a predetermined type of arrhythmia.
A further illustrative embodiment includes an exemplary system. The system comprises an implantable medical device. The implantable medical device includes a controller to control the implantable medical device, memory coupled to the controller to store at least one occurrence of at least one type of arrhythmia over a predetermined period of time, and a medical device transmitter coupled to the controller to transmit the at least one occurrence of the at least one type of arrhythmia. The system further comprises a programmer. The programmer includes a processor to control the programmer, a programmer receiver coupled to the processor to receive the at least one occurrence of the at least one type of arrhythmia, and a display that includes at least one graph showing the frequency of the at least one occurrence of the at least one type of arrhythmia over the predetermined period of time.
A further illustrative embodiment includes an exemplary data structure. The data structure comprises at least one count variable to contain a count of a frequency of the at least one type of arrhythmia. The data structure further comprises a recorded episode data structure to ascertain that at least one type of arrhythmia is present, wherein once the recorded episode data structure ascertains that at least one type of arrhythmia is present, the one count variable for the type of arrhythmia is incremented.
A further illustrative embodiment includes a programmer. The programmer comprises a processor to control the programmer, a programmer receiver coupled to the processor to receive at least one occurrence of at least one type of arrhythmia, and a display that includes at least one graph showing the frequency of at least one occurrence of at least one type of arrhythmia over the predetermined period of time.
A further illustrative embodiment includes a method of presenting at least one type of arrhythmia. The method comprises monitoring a heart rate over a first predetermined duration, triggering when the heart rate reaches a predetermined threshold over the first predetermined duration to define a detected arrhythmia episode, recording when the detected arrhythmia episode is sustained over a second predetermined duration and a therapy is applied, and displaying at least one graph to show the frequency of the detected arrhythmia episode over a predetermined period of time.
These and other embodiments, aspects, advantages, and features of the present invention will be set forth in part in the description which follows, and in part will become apparent to those skilled in the art by reference to the following description of the invention and drawings or by practice of the invention. The aspects, advantages, and features of the invention are realized and attained by means of the instrumentalities, procedures, and combinations particularly pointed out in the appended claims.